Musicians put on stage act to attract political involvement

By Sylas Wright

In somewhat of a flashback to the late 1960s and early ’70s, left-leaning musicians are pressing for change—of a peaceful nature—and rallying fans to do the same.

With anti-war and anti-Bush sentiment peaking near the end of the free-for-all presidential race of 2004, artists of all eras and genres are uniting in an attempt to oust President Bush.

The result of their efforts—anti-Bush tours and CDs.

“We’re trying to put forward a group of progressive ideals and change the administration in the White House,” Bruce Springsteen said this summer in a statement to the Associated Press, referring to this fall’s Vote for Change tour. “That’s the success or failure, very clear cut and very simple.”

Springsteen performs along with an all-star lineup of prominent artists, in the Vote for Change tour, which kicked off Sept. 27 in Seattle and ends Oct. 11 in Washington, D.C.

The fund-raising tour hits 36 cities in 12 states, nine of which are battleground states expected to help decide the November election—Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Ohio, Michigan, Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, Wisconsin and Florida.

California is not a battleground state and is not on the list.

The Vote for Change tour will be presented by MoveOn PAC, a grassroots political action committee, and proceeds will go to America Coming Together (ACT), a liberal political group that seeks the removal of Bush.

Springsteen and his E Street Band will be backed by an array of artists, such as Jackson Browne, Keb’ Mo’, Bonnie Raitt, John Fogerty, James Taylor, Dave Matthews Band, John Mellencamp, R.E.M., Dixie Chicks, Jurassic 5, Sheryl Crow, Pearl Jam and others.

“It’s a pretty clear-cut decision in November,” Springsteen said in the AP statement. “We’re chipping in our two cents. That’s all we’re trying to do.”

A large number of punk rockers have chipped in their two cents, as well.

Fat Wreck Chords—a well-known punk rock label owned by Mike Burkett, aka Fat Mike of NOFX—released a compilation CD in April entitled “Rock Against Bush Vol. I,” and followed in August with “Rock Against Bush Vol. II.”

Volume I includes bands NOFX, Social Distortion, The Ataris, New Found Glory, Descendents, Ministry, Anti-Flag, and 19 others. On Volume II: Green Day, Bad Religion, Operation Ivy, Foo Fighters, Lag Wagon, No Doubt, Dropkick Murphys and another 21 groups.

Proceeds from the Bush-bashing CDs go to the nationwide Rock Against Bush Tour, featuring Anti-Flag, Tom Morello’s acoustic act, Midtown, The Nightwatchman, The AKAs, The Epoxies, Strike Anywhere and others.

The Rock Against Bush Tour began in Portland, Ore. on Sept. 18 and ends in Pittsburgh on Oct. 9.

Two California shows have already taken place—Sept. 21 at The Fillmore in San Francisco and Sept. 22 at the Henry Fonda Theatre in Los Angeles.

Vincent Lavery, co-chair for Kerry/Edwards campaign in Fresno County, thinks the politically oriented tours will have a minimal effect on the presidential election.

“I don’t know much about the concerts,” Lavery said, “but I don’t think they’ll have much influence on voters. People go primarily for entertainment. They already have a preconceived notion about who they’re going to vote for.”

Doris Dingle, the Fresno County Bush campaign chair, also questioned the amount of influence musicians have.

“A lot of older people will be turned off by that kind of thing,” Dingle said about the anti-Bush music. “[The musicians] will have some influence, but only with people who are star-oriented and look at some kind of star image for an opinion.

“A lot of the young people who go to these traveling concerts go for the music, and most won’t even vote,” Dingle said.

Joel Redding, an avid punk rock fan of 12 years and recent Fresno State graduate, agrees with the artists’ political messages, but like Dingle and Lavery, does not think the political tours and CDs will be a decisive factor in the election.

“I think, for the most part, people have already decided who they’re going to vote for,” Redding said. “So [the musicians] are just preaching to the converted. They might make some people think, but generally people buying it already agree.”

Redding said he thinks the tours have more potential than the CDs to influence people because of the political information likely to be strewn about the concert venues. He also thinks because of a larger fan base, the Vote for Change Tour will have a bigger impact than the Rock Against Bush Tour.

Singer and guitarist Justin Sane of Anti-Flag told the AP that he’s participating in the Rock Against Bush Tour because, “our brothers and sisters of this human race are dying for George Bush’s friends in corporate America who profit from the invasions of Iraq, Afghanistan, and The U.S.-orchestrated coup in Haiti.

“This may not bother you now, but when someone you love is shipped off to Iraq to fight for greed, or you find your feet in a pair of army boots in the desert, it will,” Sane said.

But not everybody involved in the music industry is liberal.

Nick Rizzuto, a 22-year-old publicist for New York radio station K-ROCK, founded ConservativePunk.com in February.

“If you were conservative or libertarian and not a bleeding-heart liberal,” Rizzuto said in an MSNBC article, “you almost felt like a bit of an outcast. I realized that not everybody in the punk scene was as left-wing as they make it out to be. There are punks who are conservatives.”

But GOP supporters of all ages, in all genres of music, are not uniting in force with the intent of deciding a presidential election like the liberal musicians of the past, and present.

The late punk rock icon Johnny Ramone, who died Sept. 16 of prostrate cancer, said in 2002 at Cleveland’s Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame, “God bless President Bush and God bless America.”

Also pro-Bush in the music industry are old school rockers Alice Cooper and Ted Nugent, country singer Toby Keith, fiddler Charlie Daniels and Metallica lead man James Hetfield. But they are not producing anti-Kerry CDs, or touring with the intent of influencing the masses.

Dave Matthews, a native of South Africa who formed the Dave Matthews Band in the early 1990s, said on the ACT Web site, “a vote for change is a vote for a stronger, safer, healthier America. A vote for Bush is a vote for a divided, unstable, paranoid America.

“It is our duty to this beautiful land to let our voices be heard. That’s the reason for the tour. That’s why I’m doing it.”